Bob looked around the medieval village curiously. There were a dozen or so buildings, only one of which was two stories. That particular building was also the largest, and the sign in front of it showed a crudely painted bunch of berries next to a stylized wave, with the words "Sweetwater Inn" stenciled beneath.

He was fairly certain he could identify a stables, a smithy, and a bakery was well, but it was the sound of combat that caught his attention.

"This way," Jason said as he hurried down the single street that ran through the village.

Bob followed, and they quickly came to a wooden palisade. A dozen men and women, dressed in simple homespun clothing, were wielding pitchforks and the occasional rusty spear against smaller green skinned humanoids that were assaulting the palisade.

A heavy set man noticed them, and pulled back from the fighting, jumping down from the walkway. Given that the palisade was all of eight feet tall, and the walkway only half that, it wasn't a terribly long jump. "Adventurers, Gods be praised! Fairdale is beset by a horde of blood thirsty goblins! They've killed or abducted dozens, and we are all that remains! We've fortified the Inn to keep the children safe, but we can't hold the wall much longer! Help us, I beg of you!"

Bob frowned and pushed mana into the spell pattern for mana sight. As always, a Dungeon was full of mana, but he concentrated on the man in front of him, who was anxiously looking between Jason and himself. It was definitely not a person. It didn't have a matrix...

"Is that an Elemental?" Bob asked hesitantly.

"Damn," Jason sighed, "I thought it would take you longer than three seconds to figure that out. Yeah, all the towns people, as well as the goblins attacking the palisade are elemental constructs created by ritual magic."

"Suprisingly life like," Bob replied thoughtfully.

"You can program elemental constructs with fairly complicated instructions," Jason agreed. "The mayor here is giving us the quest to go outside the palisade and start clearing out the goblins. All you need to do is say something that includes the words yes, or help."

The mayor, hearing the two words he was looking for, adopted an excited expression. "Thank you! We'll keep holding the palisade while you go clear the field beyond. Be careful! Goblins are tricky bastards, and they'll kill you, cook you, and eat you if you give them the chance!" The mayor lowered his voice. "If you're very lucky, they'll do it in that order." He then turned and climbed back up on the walkway and shouldered his way back into the battle.

"That's not foreboding at all," Bob said, following Jason as they moved towards a barred door in the palisade.

"Yeah, I'm going for a traditional adventure, but I've made sure to drop warnings that while the adventure is artificial, these are real monsters, and they will kill you," Jason replied as he opened the door, and stepped outside.

The area outside the palisade was comprised of neat fields, each with a low stubble of wheat, and sheafs leaned together at regular intervals.

"Goblins hide behind, and even inside of the sheafs," Jason explained. "They're level five, so we can walk right by them."

Bob walked alongside Jason as they strolled across the field, coming to the road that led to the gates the villagers were defending. Turning their back on the village, they continued down the road.

"How big is this floor?" Bob asked.

"Four square miles," Jason replied. "without the monsters respawning, I needed to make it large enough that it could enough monsters to be worthy running."

"How many monsters in total?" Bob asked.

"One thousand," Jason said.

Bob still had his mana sight active, so he could see the flows of mana. Each sheaf either hid or housed five or ten goblins. He couldn't argue with Jason's logic. As fucked up as it sounded, Bob didn't get out of bed for less than a thousand monsters. For a party of four or five, they'd need to run this floor quite a few times to level up.

As they reached the edge of the fields, they were welcomed by a vast orchard, apples and pears if Bob wasn't mistaken. What he was having trouble with was the boundary between the two areas. The mana flows didn't make any sense.

"It's an illusion interleaved with a Gateway," Jason explained happily. "The next floor is an orchard, and no matter where you enter the gateway from, you'll come out in the same place. It's a little on the nose, but I tried creating zones, and it didn't work very well."

"Is it keyed?" Bob asked.

"Yep, you have to kill all the goblin shamans and put their key fragments together in order to get the key though," Jason pulled out a crudely shaped talisman, nearly a foot long with odd protrusions and shapes embedded in it. "There are fifty shamans, and each piece is labeled one through fifty, so it isn't that hard to figure out what you have and what you need."

"How did you get monsters to drop loot?" Bob asked curiously.

"I didn't, or I couldn't rather," Jason replied. "They're standing on top of a box that has the fragment inside. Best I could do."

Bob nodded. He'd added enough features to his Dungeons to understand how Jason had done it.

"I'm impressed," Bob admitted. "How long did it take you to put this floor together?"

"Almost four weeks," Jason sighed. "About half that was just trial and error experimentation, seeing what worked and what didn't. The next floor took two weeks, the next two weeks, then two and a half."

"I'd say you're way past anything I've put together," Bob shook his head. "My Dungeons are just simple killing floors. Is everything working the way it should?"

"Ship shape and Bristol fashion," Jason nodded. "I'd found a few minor issues over the past two weeks, but they were easily corrected. We've had a dozen groups run the first five floors, which is the point at which the storyline progresses to a true Dungeon crawl, and they've all been thrilled."

"D&D players?" Bob guessed.

"Quite," Jason agreed. "I believe that for the average person, their time would be better spent in one of your Dungeons, but for those who would prefer a touch of fantasy in their new magical reality, this should be wildly popular."

"How much are you charging?" Bob asked.

"Ten percent for the King of Greenwold, another ten percent for the Queen, ten percent for upkeep, and finally a modest five percent for myself," Jason smiled.

----------------------------------------

After his long overdue and repeatedly rescheduled meeting with Jason, Bob got back to work. His time in the Empire had delayed his advancement, while at the same time demonstrating with remarkable clarity that he couldn't afford to do so.

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Which was how he found himself staring at Bailli, and wondering why he'd never noticed the tiny specks of green in her grey eyes. He'd noticed the specks of blue before, but never the green.

"Bob?" Bailli said.

"Sorry, what?" He asked, pulling himself out of his thoughts.

"When was the last time you slept? I mean really slept, like falling asleep and not waking up until your body refuses to let you close your eyes again." Bailli was looking at him intently.

"I'm getting a few hours a night," he said defensively.

"How many is a few?" Bailli persisted.

"Four, sometimes five," he replied.

"Are those uninterrupted hours?" Bailli asked. "Because you were staring at me for almost five minutes. Most of the time when a man does that, I know he's just a creep, but you're not that kind of guy."

"It's not the best sleep," Bob admitted. "I keep having nightmares about that asshole nearly killing Monroe."

"You've been at it for three months," Bailli shook her head. "Harv, Elli, Dave, Amanda, Jessica, we've all agreed that the first person that saw you would sit you down and talk it out. I caught you, so talk to me."

Bob blinked, then shook his head before taking a sip from his glass of water. Had it been three months? He pulled out his phone and was surprised to see that it was dead.

He could remember the first week, because at the end of it, he'd told Yorrick to have the Summoners knock it down to twice a day, morning and night. Being woken up every hour, on top of the nightmares was a bit much. It also tended to startle him when it happened during combat.

He'd popped out a week or so later to send out a mass text message and email barrage letting everyone know he was going to be busy for a while.

"Three months?" Bob wasn't sure if he was asking.

Bailli sighed. "Yes, three months. Were it not for Yorrick messaging us every day, letting us know you were still declining the summons, we'd have been really worried, instead of just slightly worried but deeply concerned."

"Guess I'm a bit ahead of schedule," he muttered, sliding his phone back into his pocket.

Time until System Integration: 79 Days, 18 Hours, 46 Minutes, 8 seconds.

He'd been focused on pushing through the threshold to tier seven, and despite the delays, he'd managed to gather the necessary crystals ahead of schedule.

Bailli shook her head and leveled a stern glare at him. "You do know you created a mess?"

Bob stifled a yawn. Unsuccessfully. "What mess?" He asked.

"That bit you did at the end of the Empire's recruitment video," Bailli said. "I'm pretty sure that the High Priest of Vi'Radia would like a word with you."

"I'd like a word with him as well," Bob growled. "I'd like to ask how many people he's given Divine Blessings that actually knew what they were getting into."

"Well, I'm sure he'll come find you, now that you're not hiding away in your Dungeon. You are done hiding away in your Dungeon, right?"

"Mostly?" Bob replied. "I'm going to tier up, and then I'm going to grind out some levels. I'd like to be closing in on peak tier seven before the update."

"We all want to talk to you about that," Bailli said, "but it's best done as a group, and when you've had a bit more sleep. Are you going to be coming out every morning again? Because let me tell you, Thidwell is pissed that you've skipped out on his academy."

"Fuck." Bob put his head in his hands.

"You forgot, didn't you?" Bailli's voice was gleeful. "I knew it! Hah! That's two weeks of footrubs Erick owes me."

"You'd think with as many points as I've dumped into intelligence, I wouldn't forget things," Bob grumbled.

"Intelligence lets you recall things more clearly, it doesn't help you remember to recall them, that's on you. It's also why our entire world has fallen in love with cellphones. Did you know you can sync you calendar up with other people?"

"I do know, generally," Bob replied, "although I've never had anyone to synchronize my calendar with before."

"Well, you can expect a visit from Thidwell," Bailli warned. "He's probably going to wrangle some concessions out of you. If it were me, I'd offer to do double the lessons, morning and afternoon, for the next three months."

"I guess I missed a few things while I was busy," Bob admitted.

"Yeah, a few," she agreed. "We have the internet now, which is awesome. A bunch of people on Earth tried to file lawsuits for copyright infringement, but the King of Greenwold told them that he was saving the people of Earth, not their ridiculous legal code. You're apparently quite famous over there, and a lot of people are worried about how you 'went dark' after revealing that bit about Divine Blessings."

"Amanda runs my facebook page," Bob replied half heartedly. He was eyeballing the lone sausage link on his plate, and trying to decide if he wanted it or not.

"I know. She wants to get some photographs of Monroe with Icy."

Bob looked over at Monroe, who was sprawled across the other half of the table, tail swishing slightly. Icy was perched both precariously and primly atop his head.

Icy had grown up, and was now an adult cat, although she was on the smaller side of things.

At least Bob thought she was on the smaller size. Monroe was all the kitty Bob needed, so he'd never really investigated the local feline population, beyond delivering the occasional pet to Icing Death or Red Fang.

"Should probably do that sooner rather than later," Bob sighed. "I'm going to tier up Monroe when I tier up this time."

"Tier five?" Bailli asked.

Bob shook his head. "Tier six," he replied. "I should have tiered him up already, but the logistics of keeping him fed and comfortable haven't been easy to adjust to with his size at the peak of tier four."

"Is this because that fucker hurt him?" Bailli asked.

"A little?" Bob shrugged. "I was planning on tiering him up anyway, it's already to the point where he's terribly vulnerable in the Dungeon. Taking him from level sixteen to level thirty-six should boost his survivability."

Bailli nodded. "I'm planning on tiering up Icy in another month, two at the most. I just want to make sure I have a set of gear ready for her."

"Ugh," Bob groaned. "Are Gary and Nikki still booked out?"

"That's why I'm waiting," Bailli replied. "They've trained a few dozen people, but no one who is working on tier six gear yet."

"I suppose I could go to Harbordeep, or even Karce, but I'd rather stick with the people I know," Bob said.

"Speaking of people you know, you'll be here tomorrow morning, right?" Bailli asked as she stood up, leaning down to snag a protesting Icy Death.

"I will," Bob nodded, "I'll even try to make sure I've gotten a bit more sleep."

"Good, because all your friends are going to be here," Bailli looked at her phone. "It's time for my delve; I'll see you tomorrow morning."

----------------------------------------

You have reached the maximum level for your species tier. Sufficient mana crystals detected to advance to the next tier. Would you like to advance to the next tier?

Bob mentally projected 'Yes.'

Mentally project or verbally state your desired species.

'Pinnacle,' Bob mentally projected.

Pinnacle accepted. Human Paragon, Subspecies: Earth, Pinnacle template not present. System initialization in process.

This time, Bob was ready as the world exploded with light.

'Congratulations, you are the progenitor for Earth's version of the Pinnacle of Humanity,' Trebor said.

"Kind of expected it," Bob replied.

'How would you like to shape the development of this species?' Trebor asked.

Bob had given that question a lot of thought. When he'd become a paragon, he'd chosen to improve their matrix manipulation, as well as increasing the human drive toward knowledge and creativity. This time, he was going to increase their ability to manipulate mana, which was a direct extension of matrix manipulation, as well as increasing their empathy.

He'd met thousands of people throughout his life, some of them good, a very rare few bad, with most of them being alright. Not a single one of them would have suffered by having a touch more empathy. The whole damn world, no, the entire multiverse could do with a bit more empathy.

'I can't disagree with your decisions,' Trebor noted.

Bob looked at the proposed image of himself as a pinnacle. He would be nine feet tall, and nearly four feet across the shoulders. His weight would increase as well, and he'd be weighing in at six hundred and fifty-one pounds.

Beyond the shift in size, his scalera, the white part of his eye, now had a silver sheen.

"How is the Return to the Beginning blessing going to work?" Bob asked.

'Because you haven't reincarnated, you'll still resume your human appearance,' Trebor replied.

"Well, at least there is that," Bob sighed.

When he'd become a paragon, he'd suffered from almost crippling uncertainty. He'd wondered if he'd had the right to shape the future of the human race. Now? He was just grateful for the opportunity to hopefully help a few people become better. As for changing his species, he was still coming to terms with the whole Paragon thing, and spent almost no time outside of the Dungeon in that form. The one upshot to being a faux tier seven was going to be that he could still walk around as a regular human.